ABE 482Environmental Engineering in Biosystems

September 26 Lecture 10

Today
Wrap up anaerobic digestion Experimental design
Lab 2

Question for next class

Questions so far
Explain why anaerobic digestion is a neutral GHG method of generating energy Why are anaerobic digesters not good for disposing of wood waste? Name a few factors that affect biogas production in anaerobic digesters (ratio or quantity) What are the 3 anaerobic digester outputs we must consider when doing a mass balance?

Digester Heat Balance

Balance between energy produced from biogas and energy required to maintain mesophilic temperatures Other energy requirements of anaerobic digester?
Stirring, pumping, etc.

Energy produced depends on OMR, so for feedstocks with lower ODM, energy produced will be lower

Example 5
Digester heat balance If the 7,500 m3 per day of biogas is used to produce hot water only, what percentage of this hot water energy is required for digester heating? What percentage of the hot water energy from a CHP unit is required for digester heating? What percentage of energy produced (hot water only) is required for digester heating during a Saskatchewan winter?

A Comparison of Anaerobic Digestion and Composting Anaerobic Digestion Space requirement (footprint) Odours Energy balance Biogas production 50% 20% Energy surplus 100 150 m3/Mg Composting 100% 100% Energy demand Nil 12 weeks

Process time required to produce 3 weeks digestion, plus mature compost 5 weeks composting

Comparison Table From: Introduction to Anaerobic Digestion,Wolfgang Muller and Axel Huttner, ORA Organic Resource Agency Ltd., Malvern Hills Science Park, Geraldine Road, Malvern, Worcestershire WR14 3SZ, and IGW Ingenieurgemeinschaft Witzenhausen Fricke & Turk, and GmbH, Bischhuser Aue 12, D37213 Witzenhausen, Germany. Presented at the Biowaste: Digesting the Alternatives Seminar, April 2005, UK.

References
Wikipedia, 2007. Anaerobic Digestion. Online: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaerobic_digestion Accessed: October 25, 2007. Class notes for ChEng 882. 2006. University of Saskatchewan. Kiely, G. 1997. Environmental Engineering. McGraw Hill:USA. Chesshire, M. 2005. Process Calculations for FullScale Digesters. Biogas from Energy Crops and Agrowastes. 15th Jyvskyl Summer School: Cropgen.

Experimental Design
You have been asked to determine the biogas production potential of several types of feedstock How do you do it?

Feedstock biogas production

L of biogas/L of feedstock per day Feedstock 1 1.5 Feedstock 2 2.1 Feedstock 3 0.95 L of biogas/L of feedstock per day Feedstock 1 1.5 1.1 1.2 1.8 1.7 1.4 1.9 average stdev 1.51 0.30 Feedstock 2 2.1 3.9 0.8 3.4 0.8 1.4 3.6 2.29 1.34 Feedstock 3 0.95 1.8 1.7 2.1 1.9 0.8 2.3 1.65 0.57

Replication allows the degree of variability in the data to be assessed

Feedstock biogas production

Biogas production from various feedstocks

0.5

1.5

2.5

3.5

4.5

Biogas production (L of biogas/L of feedstock per day)

Feedstock 1 Feedstock 2 Feedstock 3

Experimental Design
You have been asked to optimize the operating parameters to improve biogas production from a specific feedstock How do you do it?

Biogas production by varying parameters

Temperature Feedstock 1 DM Content L of biogas/L of feedstock per day

35 40 50

5 10 15 7 12 18 4 7 9

1.8 2.1 0.7 2.4 2.4 2.4 1.1 3.6 4.4

Feedstock 2

30 45 55

Feedstock 3

35 40 55

Factorial Experimental Design

When several factors are of interest in an experiment, a factorial experiment should be used
In each complete replicate of the experiment, all possible combinations of the levels of the factors are investigated Each feedstock should be digested at each temperature and each DM content for valid comparisons
3 feedstocks x 3 DM contents x 3 temperatures equals 27 experiments

The effect of each factor can then be separately assessed Can also investigate the interaction of effects (but only with a factorial experimental design)

Biogas production by varying parameters

Feedstock 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 Temperature 25 25 25 30 30 30 40 40 40 DM Content 3 5 10 3 5 10 3 5 10 L of biogas/L of feedstock per day 1.8 2.1 1.5 2.1 2.1 0.75 1.9 2.3 1.7

Factorial Experimental Design

Effect of new treatments or factors should always be compared to a control
Treatment = new coating for o-rings Effect = increase tensile strength of orings at lower temperatures Experimental design
Measure the tensile strength of untreated and treated o-rings at 3 temperatures

Factorial Experimental Design

Are the results significant? Cannot make that assessment without a measure of the variability of data
Average Feedstock 1 Feedstock 2 Feedstock 3 25 degrees 30 degrees 40 degrees 3% DM 5% DM 10% DM 1.8 2.9 2.1 2.0 2.4 2.4 2.3 2.6 1.8 StdDev 0.47 0.62 0.79 0.49 1.00 0.75 0.69 0.62 0.85

Factorial Experimental Design

How many replicates?
Depends on how powerful you want your experiment to be

Are the results significant? Can crunch the numbers by hand, but statistical software is very useful
SPSS in computer labs Minitab more user friendly Excel will work in a pinch (if you know what youre doing)

Lab 2 Experimental Design

We have 12 reactors to play with Lets go with 2 replicates so we have 6 treatment combinations to work with
3 feedstocks, 2 DM contents? 1 feedstock, 2 DM contents, 3 pHs? ?

What will you measure?

Question for next class

Calculate the $ value of the electricity produced if all the MSW waste and manure waste produced in Canada each year was anaerobically digested.
25 million wet tonnes of MSW/year 132 million wet tonnes of manure/year
30% 30% 20% 20% dairy cow beef cow pig other

Assume digester runs 365 days a year, 24 hours a day Assume you can sell electrical energy for 14 cents/kW-hr Assume you can convert methane to electricity with an efficiency of 32%

How many Canadians will this serve?

Use: Table 1 from lecture, ASABE standards for manure composition, internet for electricity consumption of Canadians.

Next Day
Waste to energy calculation and discussion